Journal article
Brain shape changes associated with cerebral atrophy in healthy aging and Alzheimer's disease
- Abstract:
- Both healthy and pathological brain aging are characterized by various degrees of cognitive decline that strongly correlate with morphological changes referred to as cerebral atrophy. These hallmark morphological changes include cortical thinning, white and gray matter volume loss, ventricular enlargement, and loss of gyrification all caused by a myriad of subcellular and cellular aging processes. While the biology of brain aging has been investigated extensively, the mechanics of brain aging remains vastly understudied. Here, we propose a multiphysics model that couples tissue atrophy and Alzheimer's disease biomarker progression. We adopt the multiplicative split of the deformation gradient into a shrinking and an elastic part. We model atrophy as region-specific isotropic shrinking and differentiate between a constant, tissue-dependent atrophy rate in healthy aging, and an atrophy rate in Alzheimer's disease that is proportional to the local biomarker concentration. Our finite element modeling approach delivers a computational framework to systematically study the spatiotemporal progression of cerebral atrophy and its regional effect on brain shape. We verify our results <i>via</i> comparison with cross-sectional medical imaging studies that reveal persistent age-related atrophy patterns. Our long-term goal is to develop a diagnostic tool able to differentiate between healthy and accelerated aging, typically observed in Alzheimer's disease and related dementias, in order to allow for earlier and more effective interventions.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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- Files:
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 5.3MB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.3389/fmech.2021.705653
Authors
+ National Institute on Aging
More from this funder
- Funder identifier:
- https://ror.org/049v75w11
- Grant:
- R21 AG067442
- Publisher:
- Frontiers Media
- Journal:
- Frontiers in Mechanical Engineering More from this journal
- Volume:
- 7
- Article number:
- 705653
- Place of publication:
- Switzerland
- Publication date:
- 2021-07-19
- Acceptance date:
- 2021-06-22
- DOI:
- EISSN:
-
2297-3079
- Pmid:
-
35465618
- Language:
-
English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
-
2036318
- Local pid:
-
pubs:2036318
- Deposit date:
-
2024-10-09
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Blinkouskaya and Weickenmeier
- Copyright date:
- 2021
- Rights statement:
- © 2021 Blinkouskaya and Weickenmeier. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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